Bloodlines
by Rabenkind
Summary: Chpt 3 is up. Sorry it took so long, but you can finally meet the Necromancer. Thanks for taking the time to R
1. Another Hunt

Chapter 1: Another Hunt

It was way past midnight, the new moon illuminating only little of the surroundings. Carefully Dante made his way through the overgrown graveyard. This was a strange place to meet, especially since Lucia had picked it. They usually met on the Isle or in a bar near 'Devil may cry'. He never suspected a spooky streak in the fire headed Protector.

Yesterday she had called and asked him to meet her here, then with only a few words she had hung up. He knew it was important, Lucia wouldn't call without a reason, but she never had been so secretive.

It took him a while to find the statue of the angel she had mentioned, but it didn't matter, she wasn't here, yet. Wondering about what significance it could hold, he looked over the statue. It was simply another angel, wings, halo and all, except for the name chiseled on the base. A grave then? 

"Lilith." He read aloud.

"Yes, Lilith."

He turned to find Lucia standing next to a small kid's grave, a big envelope in her hands.

"I have to ask you for another favor, Hunter." On her grin he could see, that she already anticipated a yes as his answer.

"What kind of favor?" 

"Another hunt, of course." She answered. 

"A little too much for you?" 

Lucia's grin disappeared. He just loved teasing her.

"Not that kind of hunt." She informed him.

"What makes you think I would be interested otherwise?" 

"Because it is in your own best interest. But if you do not want to know, fine." Lucia shot back and turned to go.

"Hold your horses. What kind of hunt would you have me go on this time?"

"A hunt for her." She had stopped, but didn't turn, her hand pointing over her shoulder.

"Then this isn't her grave?" 

"Not likely. Necromancers have a way with death, you know."

This finally struck his interest.

"A Necromancer?" 

Lucia simply nodded and turned back toward him. "You are interested now, yes?"

"Maybe." Dante looked back at the statue. "What does she have to do with me?"

"I don't know, I'm only the messenger."

"Matier strikes again? What did she see this time?" This was really getting interesting now. The old seer had never been wrong as far as he could tell. Who knew, maybe there was such a thing as destiny after all.

"There are many gates to hell and not all of them end up on this world. The Necromancer could be a threat, but I really don't know."

"Then what do you know?" Patience wasn't exactly one of his better formed traits. In a way he was glad to be talking to Lucia and not to the seer herself. That conversation would have driven him insane.

"There are seven bloodlines of Necromancers. Lilith belongs to the seventh, the strongest according to old lore."

"What threat could a Necromancer be? They recall souls into stiffs for a short time, so they can ask them some questions. Big deal." Dante fell into her sentence.

"You have a very narrow idea of what a Necromancer does. They are guardians, too, and protectors and they hold the key to many sealed gates."

"What did Matier see, Lucia?"

She didn't answer right away, something very disconcerting.

"She saw a war of gods, Dante, and this Lilith holds the key. You have to find her, before she can open the gates."

"I never killed a Necromancer, sounds like an interesting change."

Lucia laughed suddenly. "Interesting indeed, but are you sure you can kill her?" She waved and left before he could ask her what she had meant with this remark. Didn't really matter, of course he could kill her. A Necromancer couldn't be as strong as demons, and he hadn't met one of those, that he couldn't kill. 

On the grave next to the statue, where Lucia had stood, was the envelope. At least he didn't have to start from zero. On the way back to the bike he looked through the contents: a letter from Matier, some newspaper clippings, a necklace and a picture of a little girl. Maybe that was harder then he thought. Necromancer or not, he couldn't just go and shoot a little school girl.


	2. Game Plan

Chapter 2: Game plan

Trish was already waiting for him when he entered DMC.

"Do I get to play this time?" she asked with a pleading expression.

"Sure, as soon as we figured out the game." 

Dante threw her the envelope.

"You're kidding, right? This is just a little girl." Trish complained when she saw the picture. 

He took it out of her hand and looked at it.

The little girl was pretty in her own way. She made the impression of being sick, because of how pale she was. It was closer to the color of porcelain then human flesh, if the colors of the picture were realistic. Her hair looked black except for where the sun reflected of it, there it was a dark, deep burgundy. Not even her eyes seemed to have much color, but starred back at him in a slate gray, deep sorrow mirrored in them.

He turned it over. The stamp was smudged, but he could make out the year.

"This picture is 13 years old.  She must be, what…., 20 now?" he guessed. At least he was rid of the worry that he would face a kid.

"A Necromancer? What could be so important about her?" Trish seemed amused. "They need you to take care of a Necromancer? This is funny, really."

"Well, maybe there is more to it." 

A whole lot more, if Matier turned out to be right.

He was looking at the front of the picture again, trying to imagine how she would look now. Success eluded him, though, he just couldn't see it, but at least he was sure that he would recognize her when they ran into each other. A woman like that would stand out anywhere.

For a moment he mused over the expression the girl had on the picture. The sorrow and pain seemed so familiar. It must have been taken after a great loss. He only had felt that when his mother had died. Maybe she had lost someone shortly before this picture was taken, someone like her parents, or maybe a sibling?

"What does Matier write?" he asked Trish, caught in the spell of the girl's picture.

"Something about a ceremony on her 21st birthday and something about that talisman." She threw him the necklace.

"Sounds like you're going to need that."

He caught it out of the air, but after touching it even with gloves still on a strange tingle made him drop it.

"What the hell…?"

Trish looked up from the letter. "What?"

Dante knelt next to it, eying it suspiciously without touching it. The side that had landed up had demonic scripture engraved. It looked like a protection spell.

"You touched it, right? Why did it not zap you?"

Her shoulders shrug. "It is probably supposed to protect humans, not devils." She guessed.

Carefully he picked it up on the black leather band and let it tangle in front of his face. The other side had also an engraving, but he had never seen the signs before. The only thing he could identify was a dragon looking beast with a scythe. Regardless of what it was, it was master craftsmanship. Only rarely had he seen so much detail on an engraving of this size.

"Does she know what it protects against?"

"No, just a guess. She thinks that this enables the person wearing it to descend to the deathplains without dying."

She looked up, puzzled. "The deathplains? I thought hell was the underworld."

"Dead souls have to go somewhere and only a few are that evil." He mused.

"So we're talking limbo, or what?" 

He had no idea, to be honest. Hell was all he had seen, and of that he figured it was only a small portion of the place. So why shouldn't there be a place like the deathplains.

"And how do I get there?"

Trish put the letter aside and scanned the news paper articles.

"I don't know, but it says here that her family owned a mansion outside of town."

"How convenient. I guess we should check it out."


	3. Enter the Necromancer

Hey everybody,

Sorry it took so long, but I just finished school and started a new job.

So here is the next chapter. Please R&R.

Chapter 3: Enter the Necromancer

"Come on, Lily. It's time." Her cousin poked her head in the door and gasped. Actually it was her step cousin. Everybody she considered family was step something, but sometimes she had the feeling that she was closer to them then she could ever have been with her real family. A common history made a lot of difference. Ever since she could remember, she had been growing up with these people around, guiding her. She didn't really have many memories of her mother or stepfather, who had died in a car crash when she was seven years old. Actually, that wasn't really correct, she had pushed aside the memories, locked them away somewhere deep in her subconscious, so she didn't have to deal with it. In a sense she thought it better to not remember, the pain was still unbearable, because she suspected that at least her mother's death had been her fault.

And now she stood here in this huge mansion her mother had grown up in. Even her room felt like a strangers, only the faint scent of roses stirred some memory. Lily hated roses, probably because they had been her mother's favorite. She preferred Lilies, white Lilies. Being the death flowers of choice for her family it fit perfectly with what she was and of course her name, even though it was derive from something else.

"Lily?"

Finally her attention went back to the living, her cousin still starring at her with an open mouth.

"Do you mind?" her hand hit her wide open chin and clapped it shut. Aki looked confused for a moment then blushed.

"Sorry. They're waiting for you downstairs."

Lily nodded and followed her cousin downstairs, where the rest of 'local' family awaited her.

"Are you ready?" her uncle looked like he had seen a ghost, but he didn't say anything and Lilly knew better then to ask. If he wanted her to know, he would tell her otherwise it was simply not important.

Lily nodded and opened the display case in which her mother's priced possession had been waiting for her. She opened the book and scanned it for the map that would tell her the place of her last ceremony. The fact that it was so early in the book was a little scary, making her wonder what else she would find in its pages, once she had become a full Necromancer.  

"It looks like an old cathedral in a small village nearby." She stepped aside so her uncle could see it.

"That's it then." He looked back at her, obviously concerned.

"Are you afraid?"

Lily listened deep inside her. Afraid? She wasn't really sure what she felt, but afraid didn't seem to fit. She shook her head.

"You should be! This is the last test, you are on your own. Nobody is allowed to help in any way, you understand."

Nothing she didn't know already, of course she understood and nodded.

"Fine. I'll see you tomorrow." With those words her uncle left, her cousin in tow. Nobody was left in the house other then herself. Outside the guards would remain on their posts and a limo was waiting to take her where she needed to go.

She still had some time, so she flipped through the book. Right now she didn't look for anything specific, it just seemed a good idea until the flow of the pages was disrupted by something like a bookmark. She picked it up. A small red envelope that had been sealed a long time ago. With shaking hands she opened it and poured the contents into her cupped hand. It was a necklace with three different pendants on a thin leather strap. For a moment she stared at it. No one had ever mentioned it, nor had she seen it in any of the pictures. She didn't get any further in her thoughts, because the driver had just come in looking for her.

"We should go, Miss Lilly."

"Of course." She slipped the necklace into her pocket and followed him outside to the car.


End file.
